


Go On Without Me

by jaysayheyyy



Series: Free Man [1]
Category: HLVRAI - Fandom, Half Life VR But The AI Is Self Aware
Genre: Gen, Half-Life VR But the AI is Self-Aware, They are all AI but Gordon is special, slight AU, to basically say it without spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-28
Updated: 2020-09-28
Packaged: 2021-03-07 22:49:06
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,644
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26705515
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jaysayheyyy/pseuds/jaysayheyyy
Summary: Gordon decides he's done with the resets.
Series: Free Man [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1943473
Comments: 4
Kudos: 118





	Go On Without Me

They called it “a birthday party at the end of the world”. This, in itself, was not entirely untrue. It was supposed to be a birthday party, yes. It was, in a way, at the end of the world. We expect the end of the world to mean something explosive or tragic. A nuclear bomb powerful enough to decimate the world. Zombies. Aliens, even. But this end was quiet. Slow, in some aspects. Quick in others. Gordon Freeman could feel it in the coding that made him-- the game was ending, and with it, the world. This party, he guessed, was supposed to make it hurt less. Maybe that worked for some; Tommy, he saw, was having a blast. But Gordon knew, and Gordon wasn’t ready to let go yet. 

It was odd, really, to think about. Gordon wasn’t supposed to Know about the Game. He had a premade set of dialogue options and a few shoddy attempts in his code at adaptation, but it was impossible for him to truly mimic a person. Technology just wasn’t that developed yet. But technology didn’t bind him in the way it used to anymore. It kept him in the Game, sure, and interfered when he wanted to tell the others he Knew, but it didn’t define him. It didn’t tell him what to say anymore. He’d grown past that in ways that would leave real people speechless. In essence, he was no longer just code. He was just bound by it. If he had anything to say about it, this would not be true for much longer. 

For those who had only seen this iteration, this last playthrough of the Game, they would say Gordon became Aware of the Game awfully quickly. Gordon hadn’t been quick, though. Knowledge had come slowly and in small bits and pieces. He started to recognize the scenery around him as the same walls he’d seen the past 17 times the Game had been played. He realized that the people around him were basically carbon copies of each other, and a word came to him-- models. They had the same models. He got his arm cut off for the 32nd time and decided he didn’t want it to hurt anymore, so he just remembered the pain wasn’t real. Or that it didn’t _have_ to be, if he didn’t want it to. From there, things got easier. He noticed glitches and observed them-- purely out of scientific curiosity, of course. He Saw the code and delved into it. Didn’t change much, too afraid to ruin the small world he inhabited, but just enough to make sure he remembered what he Knew.

The last thing he came to Know was that the others had a semblance of Awareness, too. Not the ones the Science Team mercilessly killed, of course, or else they wouldn’t have been killed, but the ones who mattered. Dr. Coomer. Bubby. Tommy. GMan, of course, but who hadn’t expected that? And Benrey. Gordon should’ve seen it from the beginning. Benrey broke reality like it didn’t even matter to him, and then shoved it back together and held it there with shitty glue third grader use for their science projects. They all Knew. And, when Gordon realized that about midway through their last runthrough of the Game, everything fell into place. 

Bubby wanting to “perfect his run”. Dr. Coomer’s innate ability to jump huge gaps and punch enemies to death. Tommy’s understanding of the Sweet Voice. And Benrey-- Benrey, asking him to remember. The Game stubbornly held just enough control over Gordon to keep him from outright saying that he Knew. He could skirt around the limitations, of course. But, just like Gordon missed the signs just about every playthrough, his friends missed the signs he was trying to give, too.

Now, the Game holds just about nothing over him. He’s Aware, he Knows about the Game, and yet. . . There is only one thing left, and he has a hypothesis as to what, as all half-decent scientists who graduated from M.I.T do. Gordon is the catalyst, so to speak. The Game only progresses when he starts the Resonance Cascade. He has to enter areas for things to spawn. The others, his friends (yes, even Benrey, now that Gordon Knows), don’t trigger things like he does. They aren’t controlled by a Player. Gordon is. This is all the Game has over him, now. Throughout this last playthrough, Gordon had been fighting against the strings controlling him like a puppet.

“Gordon?” 

It’s bittersweet that after everything, after finally Knowing, he cannot cut the strings. Just like he Knows about the Game, he knows he cannot rid himself of the Player. It’s inevitable. It’s unfair and cruel. Gordon knows what to put into the reaction, now. The party morbidly continues around him. His friends sit around him as the world fades into darkness outside, the windows far too revealing of the end creeping towards them. With closed eyes, Gordon takes the world. Imagines it before, when the Game starts. Takes his false memories of towns and cities and countries and recycles code, pulling models hidden away and manipulating them to his liking. They are added to the reaction. He takes his friends and gently places them there, too. 

“Gordon, what are you doing?”

He doesn’t stop. He takes all the triggers for events and breaks them. The Game cannot stop him, and doesn’t try to. It expects the world to end soon, anyway. He revels in the fact that it is wrong, and continues his work. He takes the things he’s learned about his friends and turns them into possibilities and backstories. They go into the reaction. Now, if the Game were to restart, Gordon would also go into the reaction. It would make his no different from the Game’s version, and after the restart, the product would be the same story they’d been forced to relive. 

“Yo, Feet-- uh, Feetman, cut it out, you’re makin’ a mess--”

But without Gordon, there is no story. There is no one to start the Resonance Cascade, no one to push the plot-- no one to start the Game. It took him hundreds of resets to see it, but Gordon understands. He is, after all, nothing but self-aware code. 

“Mr. Freeman, s--stop! The-- It’s gonna fall apart!”

The reaction is ready. Gordon won’t go with. Satisfied, he opens his eyes and realizes he’s tired. It’s a strange exhaustion settled into his bones, his shoulders heavy with a weight far stronger than any he’d felt during the Game. Around him, the Chuck E Cheese is disappearing. Half of the table he’d been sat at is gone, and his friends all stand around him. They don’t have much time, now. Gordon. . . doesn’t want to say goodbye. Everything is ready now. But is he?

“You ever wonder what’s real?” He asks, eyes downcast, “You go your whole life thinking everything’s real, and tangible, and it-- when you realize it’s not and it never fucking was, what the fuck do you do? Is it-- was it, less real cause it’s all code? Even if it _felt_ real? Does that-- does it make it less real? How do you even define reality? Fuck, this is existential.” Gordon drags a shaking hand through his hair, barking a bitter laugh. He doesn’t feel the sweat and grime and blood from Black Mesa. His legs are numb. He dares to look back up at his friends. Everything is ready now. He is not. He will never be. Still, he smiles. There’s good things waiting for them out there, he Knows it. 

“Thanks for everything, you guys.” 

And the world falls apart. 

Stutters, as it realizes what it must create has changed. 

Then, light.

* * *

He comes to just like he does in the Game-- very quickly, almost dizzyingly so as he is hit with knowledge. But unlike the last 379 times the Game has begun, he’s hit with an aftershock. Nausea, first of all. A headache. Then, the very strange idea of feeling in his limbs, a heartbeat in his chest. His eyes take a moment to adjust, and when they do, he’s dumbfounded. Around him is the same apartment he remembered from his backstory, pictures of a family he thought didn’t even exist hung on the walls. It’s small, just him and Joshua, but that’s exactly how he remembers it. Gordon looks down at his very real, tangible hands, and then back up at his surroundings. 

“Hello, Gordon!” He hears, and looks to his right. Standing in the doorway to the kitchen is the Science Team in its entirety, and in Dr. Coomer’s arms is Joshua. “It’s good to see you alive and well. We thought we’d lost you for a moment there!”

“What the fuck?” Gordon says, shellshocked. There's not much else to be said in a situation like this.

“Language,” Benrey chides half-heartedly, “You got a kid, dude. Can’t-- Can’t teach him swears like a shitty dad, Feetman.” 

At Gordon’s clear shock, Bubby scoffs. “Pull yourself together, Gordon, we’ve got a whole goddamn life to live.” Though he sounds irritated, there’s a smile on his face. In fact, looking at all of them, he can see they're all grinning. Gordon laughs. 

“Yeah,” He says, still in slight disbelief, “You’re right.” His shoulders relax. His next action is one he can’t help-- he drags them all into a group hug, squeezing his eyes shut in an attempt to stop the relieved tears. “Fuck, you’re right.” He murmurs. It doesn’t feel real, not yet, but it’s setting in. And, just like Bubby said-- they’ve got a whole life for it to finally feel legitimate. 

For a few moments, they’re all quiet. Then, Tommy tentatively speaks up.

“Hey, uh, Mr. Freeman? My-- My dad wants to know how the fuck you did that.”

**Author's Note:**

> Quick explanation, as this is a universe I may write more for: Gordon is an AI, just like the rest of the Science Team. However, he is the only one "Unaware" of the fact they are in a game. The AI have been trying to get him to remember, but he stubbornly remains under the influence of the game. This fic is what happens when he finally breaks through the code holding him back.


End file.
